July 2026: UFA joined an amicus brief in a landmark Eleventh Circuit case affirming that parents retain a fundamental constitutional right to raise and live with their children, even after a criminal conviction, and that states cannot categorically deny that right without individualized review.
April 2026: UFA member Michael Ramey’s organization publishes the State of Parental Rights, which features an article by him on bipartisanship and one by UFA’s Josh Gupta-Kagan on Hidden Foster Care.
January 2026: UFA members are instrumental in drafting and publishing an American Legislative Exchange Council model policy to protect due process for families facing potential separation.
November 2025: UFA member Brandon Logan publishes Reclaiming Foster Care: An America First Vision for Protecting Children and Strengthening Families.
March 2025: UFA member Johana Scot is instrumental in proposing legislation in Texas that would require child welfare agencies to undertake “active efforts”—a higher legal standard—before removing children from their homes, and would raise the burden of proof for terminating parental rights.
February 2025: UFA member Chris Gottlieb is co-counsel on a landmark case ruling that New York City’s practice of requiring child welfare investigations of parents who are victims of domestic violence is illegal.
September 2024: UFA member Josh Gupta-Kagan publishes (De)Funding Family Separations, a review of federal financial incentive structures in child welfare with recommendations on how to structure them to support keeping families together.
February 2024: UFA member Chris Gottlieb’s Family Defense Clinic at NYU is instrumental in filing a class action lawsuit challenging illegal searches, highlighted in the New York Times and The Imprint.
September 2023: New legislation (SB 614) restricts hidden foster care in Texas, providing parents with notice of their right to counsel prior to voluntary placements, limiting the time children can be in such placements, and requiring the Department of Family and Protective Services to publish data on hidden foster care.
August 2023: National Coalition for Child Protection Reform, led by UFA member Richard Wexler, releases Colorado Trails, a report that details the CO Department of Human Service’s harms to children.
August 2023: The University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School and Temple University Beasley School of Law collaborate with Community Legal Services of Philadelphia on a report, Advocating Abolition of PA ChildLine Registry.
July 2023: UFA joins a national coalition in Washington, D.C. to raise awareness about hidden foster care in a Congressional briefing, in partnership with the Congressional Caucus on Foster Youth.